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Monday, June 8, 2009

Went to pick up some of the Chinese students to go to church today... But when I got to their dormitory, my interpreter was there standing with only 1 of the Chinese students. She said the others probably decided not to go at the last moment.While in church, I noticed that my interpreter kept on going for tissue... Then I noticed that she kept wiping her eyes. I then immediately started to pray for her... She then thanked me afterwards...After church, she said the reason why she was shedding tears was because she said for 10 years now, she has been attending the church (the only one in this area of approx. 35000 people) and she doubt if the membership has grown by 2 in the last 10 years... She said she is tired of trying and trying... I however gave her some encouragement and told her that she have to realize the following:

1) Japanese people are very shy...So to even go and have a simple conversation with someone, can be considered going out of their way...

2) The Japanese churches don't do much evangelism..... and if they do it, not many people are interested.

3) Most Japanese people in general, has no interest whatsoever in Christianity.

4) If a Japanese person becomes a Christian, they run the risk of being banished by their friends and family....

She then agreed with me about all this... I told her that if Christianity is to spread in this area, we would have to keep some sort of conference with many foreigners and Japanese together, and have translators... I also think that some sort of English school would help out as well.

After church, a couple of us met up and had lunch at the same Okinawan style restaurant where we went last week.

WCC Upset

The World Council of Churches (WCC) officers who met in Geneva last week have expressed concern and regret over the release of a short list of candidates reportedly being considered for WCC general secretary.

The list was made public in a 28 May article released by Ecumenical News International (ENI), an independent ecumenical news agency based in Geneva and supported by the WCC and other ecumenical bodies.

This is the Article that they are talking about, and nobody seem to know where the leak came from:

According to sources linked to the Ecumenical Centre, where the WCC has its Geneva headquarters, six people are on a short list to lead the church grouping that now has 349 member churches - principally Anglican, Orthodox and Protestant - representing 560 million Christians worldwide. The names that have been mentioned are:

- the Rev. Robert Anderson, a minister of the (Presbyterian) Church of Scotland and chief executive of the Scottish Churches World Exchange;

- the Rev. Daryl Balia, a South African Methodist who is international director of Edinburgh 2010, an event to mark the centenary of the World Mission Conference that took place in Edinburgh, Scotland, seen as marking the start of the 20th century movement for church unity;

- the Rev. Fernando Enns, a Mennonite theologian who is director of the Institute for Peace Church Theology at Hamburg University, and who was born in Curitiba in Brazil;

- the Rev. Kenneth Kearon, an Irish Anglican who has been secretary general of the Anglican Communion since 2005;

- the Rev. Seong Won Park, a Korean theologian and former secretary for cooperation and witness of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches;

the Rev. Olav Fykse Tveit, the general secretary of the (Lutheran) Church of Norway's council on foreign and ecumenical relations.

One of the members of the search committee, the Rev. Gregor Henderson of the Uniting Church in Australia, had stepped down from the committee and was believed to have been a candidate for the post, but is not on the short list.

Another of the original candidates not on the short-list of candidates is the Rev. Heikki Huttunen, the general secretary of the Finnish Ecumenical Council. "I was a candidate, but never made it to the shortlist," Huttunen told ENI.